Background

The Inman lineage of interest for the Tapestry are those related to the marriage of Jane Walker, a descendant of Samuel Walker of the Natural Bridge line of Wigton Walkers, and John Ritchie Inman. This line connects with several well established lineages associated with Old Augusta Tapestry, as illustrated in the following descendancy diagram:

With the exception of John Ritchie Inman, all of the above, or their descendants, are known to have passed through Old Augusta County prior to the Revolution.

The Inman's may, or may not, have passed through the area covered by the Tapestry. However, their connection to so many Tapestry families is of interest, and exploring the Inman's may yield useful insight into other lines. For example, of particular interest here is the connection to the Alexander Cowan in Jefferson County, TN. This Alexander may or may not be the Alexander Cowan who married a daughter of John Walker III of the Wigton lineage in Southwest Virginia. Following up on the Inman's may yield information about the possible Wigton Walker connection.

Documentation

Various researchers have spent considerable time gathering information about the Inman's in America. Much of this information is currently available (March 2010) on various personal websites. (See Past Documentation of the Inman Family in America). The data these sites contain, represents a valuable resource to current researchers, but its long term availability is questionable. Since there van be no expectation that these sources will be available to future researchers, using them to document for conclusions is ill-advised, as the information they contain may not be revisitable in the future. It would be better to identify the underlying sources these works refer to, locate those sources, and use them to document conclusions. Unfortunately, with some exceptions, these works often do not provide good documentation as to where their information was obtained. As a result, it is difficult to assess the information, and difficult to resolve any conflicts in the views they present. As a result, much work is needed to recover the original information on which these works are based, and to resolve confusions into the history of the family that have been introduced.

Early History

Information about the movements and relations of this line of Inman's are not well documented and open to much confusion. There are numerous alternative descriptions of when and where they arrived in America, where they traveled, and where they settled. It appears that the family line passed through Virginia, leading to the marriage of Person:Abednego Inman (1) and Person:Mary Ritchie (1) sometime about 1778. Where that marriage occurred is unclear, and ill documented. .

Ancestry

The following is a quick sketch of the line of descent leading up to John Ritchie Inman, the focus of the current analysis

Data available on the internet about the ancestry of this line is confused, with different persons pointing to an immigration into North Carolina in the early 1700's , or into Maryland in the late 1600's. Ezekiel may have been first in Maryland, then moved to Rockbridge CO VA, and then into North Carolina. This may reflect conflation of information for several different Ezekiel Inman, and may account for differences in his wife's name as given in different treatments. In anycase, our interest is with the Ezekiel who settled in North Carolina.

The Inman names appearing in Virginia in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries do appear in the area where John Inman initially settled in 1619. When Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came to this country over a century later, the three brothers first settled in Limestone, Virginia before moving on to North Carolina.

Ezekiel Inman, came into North Carolina sometime after 1730. Five sons are commonly identified: Shadrack, Meshack, Abendego, Benjamin and William. Shradrack, Meshack and Abendego are believed by some to have been long hunters with Daniel Boone, visiting southwest Virginia and Kentucky in 1767. Meshack was killed during an Indian attack during this trip. Abednego and Shadrack escaped, and eventually settled in what is now Jefferson County TN after the revolution. Abednego's wife is commonly identified as Mary Ritchie after whose family son John Ritchie Inman is presumably named.

John Ritchie Inman, son of Abendego and Mary Ritchie was born near Dandridge, Jefferson County TN in 1788. Here he meet and married Jane Walker, the daughter of Person:James Walker (114) son of Samuel Walker and Jane Patterson. By 1830 the couple had moved to Madison County, Alabama. He appears as "John B. Inman in the 1830 Madison County Census. No other Inman's appear in that year in Madison County. There are, however, several Inman's in adjacent Monroe County, Alabama, and Franklin County TN, who may be kin.

John and wife Mary had an exceptionally large number of children. Their first three children....

Diagram

Footnotes

↑ Inman Innings, a family news bulletin, 1(1), September/October 1994, currently available at Surname Web

↑ Where Beall obtained her information about settling in "Limestone, Virgina" is not known. Possibly Limestone, Mineral County, in West Virginia was meant. Possibly this is a confusion with Limestone in Washington County TN. If the former interpretation is correct, then the family would have been in that area well before most settlers.

Notes

By 1840 Lazarus [C. Inman] was living in Madison Co., AL. He became close...to Abednego's son John Ritchie Inman and his children....[He] moved to east-central MO in 1843 with John R.'s sons

James Madison Inman,

John W. Inman,

Joel C. Inman

and their sisters,

Elizabeth W. Inman (Mrs. Joseph P.) Woodruff,

Jane Inman (Mrs. George B.) Woodruff and

Caroline Matilda Inman (Mrs. Benjamin) Woodruff.

The Woodruffs settled in extreme southwest Franklin Co., MO while Lazarus and Susan went to Bourbeuse Township, Gasconade Co., MO nearby. Lazarus and Susan's eldest child, Elizabeth (1824, IN), however, went to Franklin County for her marriage license.